General > General Technical Chat
Amazon Sidewalk will soon share your Internet with your neighbors
Rick Law:
--- Quote from: rsjsouza on June 01, 2021, 01:22:48 pm ---
--- Quote from: Rick Law on May 31, 2021, 11:26:31 pm ---
--- Quote from: Sal Ammoniac on May 31, 2021, 05:47:27 pm ---It's easy to opt out of this. Open the Alexa app and go to Settings->Account Settings->Amazon Sidewalk and set the slider to Disabled.
--- End quote ---
The "Disabled" switch still leaves you with the choice of trusting that it actually is disabled as we define disabled, or merely operate in a way they can argue as "disabled".
--- End quote ---
Not only that, but in the future they can re-enable this feature silently after a firmware upgrade at the guise of "enhancing the functionality of the device".
Thanks but no thanks. Convenience is usually done at the expense of security. (I am so glad that my wife is on board with me on these matters)
--- End quote ---
[RL: bold added]
Future is already here and worst - it doesn't even require any firmware upgrade, it just turned itself back to enabled. Smart devices know better, they know you really don't mean it and even if you do, they doesn't care...
This is what I found on Reddit: "PSA: I've now opted out of Amazon Sidewalk three times... ...I opted out when it first was announced. I opted out again a few weeks later. And I just opted out again a moment ago. The 'enable' toggle keeps going to enable. Shocking."
Others reported similar behavior.
https://www.reddit.com/r/HomeNetworking/comments/nnugs0/psa_ive_now_opted_out_of_amazon_sidewalk_three/
I think in part it is the impact of Smart Phones. The "smart consumers" have their phones net-enabled already. So they skipped out of paying for a home ISP connection. This is the IoT device makers/sellers' way of expanding their market to the phone-only consumers: let those who has it shares, most wont know they are sharing anyway. So who cares - we "make it so" whether they wanted to share or not.
graybeard:
--- Quote from: Sal Ammoniac on May 31, 2021, 05:47:27 pm ---It's easy to opt out of this. Open the Alexa app and go to Settings->Account Settings->Amazon Sidewalk and set the slider to Disabled.
--- End quote ---
You should not have to opt-out. My 94 year old mother has an Alexa device my cousin set up for her several years ago. I need to go to her house and do a hard reset (if possible) or trash it.
Cubdriver:
And this is why I don't have any Amazon devices...
-Pat
DrG:
But Sidewalk is also a vast new wireless network entirely controlled by Amazon — and paid for by us......Which raises the question: Shouldn’t Amazon be paying us? https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/06/07/amazon-sidewalk-network/
Amazon Sidewalk Privacy and Security Whitepaper (pdf) https://m.media-amazon.com/images/G/01/sidewalk/final_privacy_security_whitepaper.pdf
So many red flags and so little benefit and such a goldmine for NOT you.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[*] Previous page
Go to full version